Office 2007 RTM and Installations

So, now that Office 2007 has been released to manufacturing (RTM), many of us who are MSDN or TechNet subscribers are busily downloading, testing, and seeing what’s good with the final release. I have to admit, Beta 2 TR was pretty flawless–so I’m stoked to see how the final build went (it’s downloading as I type).

I did come across a snafu, though, that should be more readily presented by MSFT (or handled by their installer), but doesn’t appear to be.

You remove the beta release version of a 2007 Microsoft Office suite or program from the computer. When you try to install the original release version of the 2007 Office suite or program, you receive the following error message:

Setup is unable to proceed due to the following error(s): The 2007 Microsoft Office system does not support upgrading from a prerelease version of the 2007 Microsoft Office system. You must first uninstall any prerelease versions of the 2007 Microsoft Office system products and associated technologies. Correct the issue(s) listed above and re-run setup.

The catch? Those of us running Expression Web Designer are in a bind… as with the catches on installing .NET 3.0 and TR, it appears the final release is also plagued and leaving designers with a choice: Upgrade to RTM or stick with Beta 2 TR until the Web Designer gotchas are fixed.

In my scenario, I’m actually upgrading. Web Designer has been a cool tool to dink around with, but I’m not using it for any serious projects and can easily pick it back up after the fixes go through.